I think his stay here will eventually lead him to the truth because usually the uninterested people leave after awhile, whereas RB keeps asking questions. Sure sometimes he has creative statements but don't we all ?

Ah, the patience of a cleric! Your beard must be growing longer, young seminarian! Point conceded, sort of...

Demetri

Logged

"Religion is a neurobiological illness and Orthodoxy is its cure." - Fr. John S. Romanides

No, patience was my first trip to India where I roomed for five weeks with a militant gay*, Wicca-practicing, sociology major, African-Americans-are-completely-oppressed man who ended up being a nice guy and a friend

anastasios

* I.e. the rare gay person who tries to convince other people that they are really gay too. The whole time, I was encouraged to "find my feminine side." I usually responded, "she's back in the United States."

If RB is able to access all of these rites he's most fortunate. Would a Catholic be able to attend the other eastern rites which you mention?

In theory yes. Chances are in the US, especially in the big cities such as New York, Chicago and LA, you can find several of the Eastern rites I named.

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Here in Ireland anyone who is not attending the Novus Ordo in English is regarded with suspicion and ostracized. I used to attend the NO in Latin but the priest admitted that it was offered as a sop to older parishoners and would be discontinued when they passed on. I then went to the Tridentine Mass which could only be offered on alternate months and where every possible obstruction was put in our path from the begruding permission of the bishop, through the fact that no official source would advertise it, to the constant problems with finding a church willing to allow its celebration. I think many people thought that Ireland would be some last great bastion of the old ways, they couldn't be more wrong.

Almost nothing surprises me any more. That this is the situation in a country whose name is virtually synonymous with 'Catholic'* is, in one word, perverse.

*True in the States because of 19th-century immigration. Fun fact: in spite of that immigrant presence and influence, most Americans who claim Irish ancestry are... Protestants, owing perhaps both to the presence of the Protestant Irish (Ulster Scots and even southern Irish Presbyterians) in America since the 1700s and assimilation. Another fun fact: Barry Fitzgerald, who played a priest in 'Going My Way' because of his southern Irish accent, was a born and lifelong Presby.

well, I believe that we express the same faith but differently. you know that the early unified church was very diverse in its understanding of the faith. Why can't there be diversity now?

Diversity in some things is fine - however when that diversity touches fundamentals, then it is a problem...this is why so much of that early "diversity" you speak of ended in heresies and schisms, many of which were never healed.

As for Orthodoxy and Catholicism having the "same faith" but simply with a different expression, I beg to differ. Catholicism has come to define itself solely in judicial terms, to the point that it has invented doctrines alien to both Western and Eastern Fathers. One could not begin to speak with any seriousness of "indulgences" without first having a concept of salvation which would have been just as foreign to St.Gregory the Great or St.Vincent of Lerins as it would have been to St.Athanasios or St.Photios the Great.

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we catholics are open to the diversity of the faith but you guys are not. you guys want us to abandon our traditions and replace them with yours.

What the Orthodox world would like, is for the Latins to return to their own, Orthodox traditions, both in terms of faith and praxis. Orthodoxy does not have a problem with the Church of St.Gregory the Great - but that is not what the RCC is, and it hasn't been this for centuries.

Of course, it's impossible to go into a time machine and just set everything back - thus the only real option would be some kind of revision of Latin practices (perhaps starting with a return to pre-Vatican II RC usages, which at least still exist within the living memory of the RCC...these in turn could be corrected so as to expunge from them doctrinal errors which crept into Latin liturgical services).

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Is that why you go to mass, to be impressed? I thought that it was to recieve jesus.

If I went to a family gathering where my grandmother was present, only to find everyone was treating her contemptuously (indulging in riotous behaviour in front of her, making light of what she had to say, etc.), I would be as guilty as they if I just sat there and played along. Sure I could try and sneak in a kind conversation, and perhaps not myself say anything rude to her, but this would not undue the harm of my own indifference to their awful behaviour.

Frankly, the "new mass" and the "new attitude" of the RC's is borish, and not too seldom, sacreligious. It's more appropriate to a secularized protestantism that doesn't pretend to hold it's possessions as being anything sacred, than it is to a church which says it offers the holy oblation upon it's altars. The whole approach in most RC temples is not simply too casual as far as most Orthodox are concerned, but downright inappropriate. God is not mocked - a very simple Biblical maxim that many forget...the idea that He will continue to dwell amongst blasphemers is neither Biblical, nor sensible.

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I guess that you haven't seen a tridentine mass, which is the one I go to. and the new mass is very fine and inspiring when done as prescribed not with all the additions and deletions that many parishes take liberty in.

With some important revisions (mainly removal of certain troubling post-schism additions), the Tridentine Missal could (in the case of a hypothetical reunion of Rome with Orthodoxy) become a viable Orthodox service. I think people here are refering to the "New Mass", which is the rule in the RCC (and not the Tridentine Missal, which you either have to get special permission for, or be a "renegade" to avail yourself of, in the RCC). While I've heard plenty of apologies for the New Mass (typically "it can be said with great solemnity), these ring hollow - the reality is that it lends itself to a type of "worship" (if it can be called that) which is more humanistic than Theocentric. And that is what you see in most Latin parishes now days - self help and perhaps a little political activism dressed up as the good news of salvation.

Well, Jack, I see you have come full circle in what I call the Roman Catholic Logic of Denial.I posted above a link to a lengthy monologue detailing the innovations introduced in the Latin church that are not found in Orthodoxy. Either you did not read it, or did read it and dismissed it without comment, or chose to ignore it. In any case, you have fallen back to the usual papal definition of the Church using Matthew as your basis. Everytime I see this argument the image of Christ washing the feet of the apostles leaps into my mind in answer. And then I wonder, how is it that the Vaticanites cannot see their error?The link above shows in 29 or so points where your church has gone - what it has BECOME. You are asking us Orthodox Catholics to accept what you have BECOME. We ask you to RETURN to what you were which is what we ARE. If you cannot discern a difference there, there is no reason to discuss anything further.I, well-known anti-ecumenist here, did welcome and accept the apology of the bishop of Rome. And the Orthodox are not without fault in the schism - we should have pressed harder to prevent the loss of the See of Rome to the Church. I am sure the apology was genuine. However, apology or no, please do not expect us to change on that basis.

Demetri

Well, Demetri, I wasn't responding directly to you in the posting you are referring to. I obviously didn't expect you to be persuaded by it.

You're right, I haven't finished reading the material in the link you provided me. It will take me awhile to do so. There is a lot of material. When I finish, I will be happy to discuss it with you.